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A review by _dunno_
Black Milk: On Writing, Motherhood, and the Harem Within by Elif Shafak
4.0
Excellent. I postponed reading it for so long, but apparently, this was the perfect timing for this book and I. Quite intriguing, what I didn't like at its fullest now was Shafak the fiction writer. I could have been spared the conversations between her and the choir of discordant voices/Thumbelinas/finger-fairies, but then again, I completely understand the need of inserting the dialogues in the book, and maybe if I listen attentive enough I can hear my own Thumbelinas asking for their rights, pushing me into doing one thing or another.
Shafak the non-fiction writer, the mother to be and then the post-partum diagnosed new mother is something I cannot comment on. It just happens and you deal with it, one way or another. There's no solution she gives for overcoming depression, but there's her own experience to help.
And then, my favourite, Shafak the researcher, the scholar. While baffled whether it is indeed the right time to become a mother or if she will ever be a good one and a good writer at the same time, she started taking examples from the literary world, successful women writers who either chose not to have children, or had some and successfully managed being mothers and writers, plus others who abandoned them or couldn't have them. There are so many women writers on my "to-read" list right now because of how she managed to bring them up and tell their stories of womanhood and writinghood*, I think I won't be reading male writers for a while. :)
*I think this word doesn't exist, will Merriam-Webster give me some credit for it?
Shafak the non-fiction writer, the mother to be and then the post-partum diagnosed new mother is something I cannot comment on. It just happens and you deal with it, one way or another. There's no solution she gives for overcoming depression, but there's her own experience to help.
And then, my favourite, Shafak the researcher, the scholar. While baffled whether it is indeed the right time to become a mother or if she will ever be a good one and a good writer at the same time, she started taking examples from the literary world, successful women writers who either chose not to have children, or had some and successfully managed being mothers and writers, plus others who abandoned them or couldn't have them. There are so many women writers on my "to-read" list right now because of how she managed to bring them up and tell their stories of womanhood and writinghood*, I think I won't be reading male writers for a while. :)
*I think this word doesn't exist, will Merriam-Webster give me some credit for it?